In the following review of Edward Hall's 2002 Royal Shakespeare Company production of Julius Caesar, Johnson decries the cliché of presenting Caesar as a fascist dictator.

The Royal Shakespeare Company's latest Julius Caesar, just arrived at the Barbican from Stratford, has Caesar as a fascistic dictator. Here we go again.

For decades that has been the only Caesar on offer from either of our national, subsidised companies. The incidence of fascist Caesars has increased the further we have travelled in time from the fascist era. When, as adolescents, we of my generation became acquainted with the plays from the Old Vic gallery, Caesar tended to be set in ancient Rome. The Caesar who, for some of us, was the role's last great interpreter—the late Brewster Mason—wore a toga...